Live Food Or Not

[jaycat]

I would like your opinions on feeding live food to your fish. Do you, or not?

I've just lost my fish to a really bad outbreak of ich, I'd introduced no new fish, or anything. The only new thing to enter the tank was daphnia. I always get it at the same place, never had a problem before. Kept fish for number of years, never lost an entire tank before. (Do have 2 cats left.)

Thoughts please.

Do you feed live food or not.

Thanks.

 

[helterskelter]

I feed live foods all the time and never had a problem.

Ick usualy get hold if the fish are stressed for some reason like poor water quality usualy, have you done any water changes of late?

 

[jaycat]

hi posted on forum last night, under 'help fish dying'. Everything I've done is noted there. My routine is 10-15% water change weekly. Water always fine, test weekly. PH only crashed after i'd used a medication.

 

[BigC]

A varied livefood diet can be beneficial to fish health. When feeding live Daphnia, bloodworm, Tubifex and Glassworm which are essentially aquatic organisms, there is always a risk of such a disease entering the aquarium.
I feed a range of livefoods most are terrestial worms and insects but also I would feed live adult brineshrimp. (Brine Saltwater) Daphmia IMO does not hold a lot of nutritional value. I dont even buy frozen Daphnia. I would buy frozen Bloodworm which have been gamma ray eradicated. (Gamma Foods). I expect you have introduced the disease via the daphnia (which are predomitatly water, seeing as everything has been fine beforehand
But in answer to your question, livefoods do definately have a role to play in your fishes diet
Regards
BigC

 

[Colin_T]

it's unlikely the daphnia introduced ich unless there were fish in the water the daphnia was collected from. Daphnia as such don't actually carry the parasite but it could have been in the water. If you culture your own food and keep them in seperate containers they should remain disease free.
Live food is definitely a plus especially if you are trying to breed wild caught fishes. But it's also useful for breaking up the fish's routine and stimulates more natural behaviour.
I used to feed any sort of live food I could get. A couple fo times a year we get flying ants and they land in the swimming pool. I run around with a fine mesh fish net and scoop them out. The fish love them. I also use small earthworms from a worm farm, and if I swat a mozzie or fly it goes into the tank. I also run around the rose garden collecting aphids for the fish.

 

[jaycat]

Big C, many thanks for your reply.
I tried to feed my fish frozen blood worm, but they seemed too small for it. My lfs do sell live bloodworm though. Do you just drop worms in for them,a few at a time? Or use the feeder that is used for tubiflex?
I fed frozen, but they would only eat daphnia and I think it was larvae.

Lfs sell shrimp, but only larger ones.
Sould I try live bloodworm when I begin to restock?

 

[BigC]

A couple fo times a year we get flying ants

Hey Colin
I wish I had those over here. I was in QLD (Gold Coast) last year and I'm setting off again next week for a month. And that was one of the first things I noticed in my Uncles garden...the amount of livefood available WOW. Lucky you!

My lfs do sell live bloodworm though. Do you just drop worms in for them,a few at a time? Or use the feeder that is used for tubiflex?

Yeah, just give them a good rinse first in a net. I like to use a pair of tweezers and just drop them in the tank a few at a time at different spots around the aquarium. Dont need a cone feeder for these. When feeding my hatchetfish I can even suspend small bloodworm, using the tweezers, on the waters surface using the surface tension.

Regards
BigC

 

[shelaghfishface]

i treid to get hold of daphnia for my fry, my lfs dont have it live as they say ""they ""are trying to ban live foods?? why would this be, they dont sell live blood worms either
someone off here very kindley sent me some micro worm culture which i have " grown" over night, problem is i can see the porridge moving in the light but cant actually see the worms,i have dipped the paper in the tank, but the fry didnt go mad,so im assuming that evry little if anything got in there,they are 4 weeks old now and they are not doing so well, have lost quite a few ( 10) i started them on very very finely crushed flakes,but most of them are small for the age,so this isnt doing the job.....not trying to hijack the thread here but would love some imput


oh and im currently having a go at hatching some baby brine shrimp

i didnt have any luck the first time,think i was prissying about with it too much-trying to get everything perfect

 

[BigC]

PM sent Shelagh
Regards
BigC

 

[shelaghfishface]

thankyou so much bigC, that was a massive amount of quality information

shelaghxxx